That's what happens when a minority has all the money, it can influence anything (justice, politics, economy, media) and spreads the idea that redistributing correctly the wealth is dangerous /!\ Warning, socialism & communism is VERY evil /!\ and that capitalism is the only good guy ...

I have no problem with rich people. I think Bill Gates, Warren Buffett or Elon Musk deserve every penny they have because it comes from adding VALUE to society.

But this...

I guess if anything it goes to show where the stigma against anything that's not capitalism comes from. It exists for a reason and it comes from the same place that says one of our greatest issues today is class warfare and how the bottom 49% are leaches.

I'd say take action but who am I kidding. I mean the Super Bowl is on, then its Hell's Kitchen and look! Another Snotr video just got uploaded. Oh! KITTENS!

Nice propaganda...true, too, BUT...
...if we switched that system to a more fair and distributed one history of the last 100 years show the poor get even poorer and the rich get a lot poorer. Basically noone wins, it just feels more fair, since noone is rich anymore.

My professor used to say that all people either strive for equality or for freedom. The freedom to fail is what made america to the richest nation in the world. Compare those numbers to russia and it will look awesome, even for the poorest 1%.

And ughlah, was that your dance professor or cooking professor?.. if that's what professors are teaching these days, I believe it's time to burn the schools, because what you quoted there is called "non-invasive lobotomy"... it's systematic mind destruction.
Hint, check Sweden... terrible, Terrible communists... maybe we should bomb them.. humanitarily of course, to free them from that egalitarian nightmare.

What the graphs portray is financial Apertheid, these people aren't just separate, apart, segregated... they're essentially a different species.

Greed is the key problem. That is why it'll NEVER work and there will always be the "top" which is far apart from everyone else. Doesn't matter what type of economic system you have... as long humans are behind it... it will always be flawed.

Yes, it'll be far worse in the future. The world is overpopulated with humans. We're the lucky ones that actually sit here and watch a video about the "problem". That's the sad part. When the overpopulation problem is solved then mankind can progress. Until then it'll only go downhills... and it'll go fast.

What this video doesn't lay out is the fact that inside the top one percent, the distribution has a similar shape. It's a small fraction of the top one percent that makes the graph turn up like that. Almost 80% of the top 1% makes less than one million dollars per year. The top few hundred (out of about 1.4 million) make hundreds of millions per year.

All thanks to conservative financial principles over the past 35 years or so.

Sweden, the home of Ingvar Kamprad?
OECD ranks Sweden in the top 3 ( along with germany and denmark) for the biggest drift between 2000 and 2010. Well the USA have a big lead there so it's no wonder they aren't rank one.

You do know what is the criteria for being poor? It's a relative number which is measured by the average income of the whole society. Being poor in Germany means you have an appartment of 500 square feet, a kitchen a tv set with a blu ray player and a computer. Being poor in Venezuela, in Cuba, in North Corea means you have difficulties getting enough food.

Basically a society which tries to shift around its wealth ends up loosing the top 10 percentile.

By the way sweden never was a socialsm, taxes are at 25% for the superrich.

But consider what this "wealth" is. The graph might lead you to believe that the rich are swimming in vats of money like scrooge mcduck, or that their wealth is a representation of their worth (e.g. they are 380X more important).

However, consider that this "wealth" is mostly what we call control of resources . Bill gates is wealthy, but only because he owns pieces of companies that provide a service and employ people.

These are complex issues to be sure, and our current system may not be ideal. However, it is easy to draw simplistic and inaccurate conclusions from a video like this, which seems to imply that "wealth" is a zero sum game rather than a byproduct of industry and entrepreneurship.

This was a pretty pointless video since wealth isn't distributed, it's earned. If you don't like the deal you've got, do something about it. Make a change. The real greed in this video is the narrator who just wants money given to him.

#15 this isn't about true capitalism. What we have now in the US is crony-capitalism. Those in power in government giving money to their buddies. And it's gotten worse under Obama. Thanks voters!

Check your facts ughlah, taxation reaches 60% in Sweden. I'm not sure what your thesis is, however you can at least present facts and not cheap propaganda. Sweden has one of the lowest Gini Coefficient in the world, also universal healthcare, free access to quality education and a functioning social security system, and subsequently Far superior social mobility than the US (social capital as well). You don't have to listen to me though... check Joe Stiglitz, Paul Krugman, or if you want a different take on things, Richard Wilkinson.

Talking about social mobility and "the american dream".. from rags to reaches, can't help but remember the Carlin locution that sounded kinda' like this: **It's called the american dream because you have to be asleep to believe it**.

''Danilov: I've been such a fool, Vassili. Man will always be a man. There is no new man. We tried so hard to create a society that was equal, where there'd be nothing to envy your neighbour. But there's always something to envy. A smile, a friendship, something you don't have and want to appropriate. In this world, even a Soviet one, there will always be rich and poor. Rich in gifts, poor in gifts. Rich in love, poor in love. ''
A quote from the movie Enemy at the gates.

Wealthy countries such as Sweden can show a low Gini coefficient for disposable income of 0.31 thereby appearing equal, yet have very high Gini coefficient for wealth of 0.79 to 0.86 thereby suggesting an extremely unequal wealth distribution in its society.

Obstfeld and Krugman may be a good source for understanding the basics of foreign trade, but they don't go into detail on current events. Stiglitz has written an inspiring book in 2002, which is basically a decade ago, in which a lot, if not all has changed. I haven't heard of Wilkinson, who seems to be an epidemiologist.

My Point is: Sure there is a problem that the rich have so much more than the poor, but that won't change if you redistribute. France has recently tried something like that. In the end Belgium and Switzerland (and Russia) have a few new multi-millionaires and billionaires who have fled france. In a nutshell: If you try to take the money from the rich and distribute it amongst the poor, the poor will stay poor and the rich will either flee oder loose their money. Noone gets richer by redistribution.

Stiglitz has written a few other excellent texts since 2002, The Price of Inequality comes to mind right about now (for some reason).

25%!?.. No, read your link again, you seem to take out of it only what you want. Add to that the municipal income tax of ~30% (average) and you get something completely different.
Wilkinson is a social anthropologist (hence, A different take on things), The Spirit Level is a mandatory read if you want to grasp the impact that inequality has at the societal level, it's not a complex or complicated read, but it is clean, clear and unbiased.

Wealth inequality is, to some extent, a product of domestic income inequality, however, major Swedish operations (including the one you quoted, which is the archetypal example for this rationale, IKEA) are multinational, and generate wealth (at the top) from massive foreign operations. The Swedish society is a reasonably (equitably) unequal one as far as income goes, and it has been so for a long time.

In regard to your point. I cannot agree to that... Let them flee, utterly useless parasites anyway...there is a Greek word that perfectly describes the pathology that these people suffer from, it is Pleonexia.
Redistribution works (all the scandinavian countries, and to a lesser extent your own, stand as living examples of it), it takes a genius not to see it.
The point isn't to make everyone rich (it's ridiculous)... the point is to have such a thing called conscience, when you do, you discover that with privilege comes responsibility, for those less fortunate that you.

The Sweden example isn't "We're all driving Porsche 911s and eating caviar off Gwyneth Paltrow's tits"... it's the fact that, while inequality still exists, not having something to eat, basic medicine and a pillow for your head is something hard to accomplish in Sweden. (this is, obviously, en exaggeration meant to enforce a point, which is... there is no captivity in poverty).

You cannot have too much either way ,there needs to be a balance between capitalism & socialism.
When i see how underpaid people are in the USA eg bar staff taxi drivers working 6 days a week who rely on tips to survive when the rich have more than enough , it really makes you think why don't the rich just pay their employees Accordingly .

While there are undoubtedly numerous reasons why everyone (myself included!) would be hard pressed to address this subject without an emotional response (after all - we all can relate to money and the need/use for it!)

But one question -- Why is the author only talking percentages in this whole video??

If there were numbers being used, we'd be able to form our own opinion.
Percentages are the way to form a Pathos based debate...

Instead the only take away here is that a millionaire has 1 MILLION times more than my 3 year old son (that 311m population statistic of the author includes him in it!....so yes, that is agreed that my son has no money )

Unless we are talking about seeking economic equilibrium in the country? (eg - regardless of your job you get paid the same amount...) Which I don't think a large percentage (see what i did there?) of the American public would be for... Unless I'm wrong, in that case, circus clown here I come!

#27 That video is a poor response. It's mainly about semantics (wealth vs income) as the the problem highlighted remains the same (funny that he doesn't show any graphs..). It also states that benefits are income which is an insult, clearly coming from a mind that has never lived in poverty and has never even had a poor friend.